Cannon Cat is a game about a cat. A cat that gets launched from a cannon – well, many cannons to be truthful. It's something of an action-physics-puzzler, though a great way to describe the game is that it's a fully-fleshed-out version of the barrel launching mechanic from Donkey Kong Country. Timing and figuring out how the cannons are laid out, and what the purpose of each cannon is in the levels is the key here, as there's just one action that the player can directly do: tapping on the screen to launch the cat. However, the cannons change direction occasionally, and move around at times, meaning that timing and figuring out how to navigate the levels are the biggest challenges. The secondary goal is to collect all the sky fish in each level. Cannon Cat isn't trying to eat them, he's trying to rescue them from Evil Emu. Also, flying penguins.

Let me take the time to remark that this game is a completely serious endeavor. Also, that previous sentence was sarcastic.

The game is universal, with letterboxing on the iPad because the game plays at the iPhone aspect ratio. Still better than not having iPad support at all, for sure. The game is free to play, with the ability to spend in-game currency called sparks on powerups that enable checkpoints, create a shield, enlarge the size of sky fish, and slow down time. These can be bought mid-game. Are they necessary? Not particularly, but they prove to be a great help, especially in the more difficult levels. Still, at least the game makes it possible to get more sparks just by playing the game, though buying them is obviously quicker.

The game's one-touch controls make it perfect for mobile devices, and it is extremely easy to pick up and play for casual players. While it feels like some of the later levels re-use elements, and that's the only concern: depth. I do think there's only so much that can be done with a one-tap control scheme, and only a few core level elements are used; even later levels just seem to be more complicated layouts of the same elements. While they are very challenging, I'd love to see more I'd love to see updates with new elements to go along with creative new level layouts.

Cannon Cat's well worth a download. Its levels may not involve many different obstacles for our flying feline hero, but its touchscreen-friendly gameplay does a lot well.

Review disclosure: note that the product reviewed on this page may have been provided to us by the developer for the purposes of this review. Note that if the developer provides the product or not, this does not impact the review or score.